HOW TO COOK

Wash the rice, replacing the water 2-3 times; drain in a colander.

Soak the rice in water for 30 minutes.

Place rice in a lidded saucepan and bring to the boil over
medium heat. Reduce heat and simmer for 12 minutes. Remove from heat,
but leave the lid on the saucepan and allow rice to rest for 10 minutes.

Mix the seasonings for the rice. Warm the mixture if the sugar has trouble dissolving in it.

Place the cooked rice in a roomy bowl and quickly stir through the seasoned vinegar.

To prepare the Tamago-yaki, crack the eggs into a bowl and add
the seasonings . Heat the vegetable oil in a small frying pan over
medium heat. Add the egg mixture and stir until partially set; slide
the mixture to one side of the pan and cook over low heat until set.
Remove and cut into 1 cm thick slices.

Soak the shiitake mushrooms in water to reconstitute them.
Remove the stems, and simmer in 1 cup of water in a lidded saucepan for
10 minutes over low heat. Add the seasonings. Reduce liquid until it
turns syrupy. Allow mushrooms to cool in mixture. Squeeze out excess
moisture, and slice into thin strips.

Devein the prawns and insert a bamboo skewer (or toothpick)
along the length of the prawns. Simmer over low heat in 1 cup of water,
to which 1 teaspoon of salt has been added, in a lidded saucepan for 2-3
minutes. Allow the prawns to cool in the water in which they were
cooked. Remove the skewers and shell the prawns.

Cut the cucumber into 1 centimetre-sized sticks; sprinkle with salt, then pat off the excess moisture.

Divide the vinegared rice into two portions. Lay out a sheet
of nori on a makisu (the small bamboo mat used for making sushi rolls).
Spread out a portion of the rice evenly across the nori but leave a 4 cm
gap on the tail end.

Lay the ingredients for the filling across the middle of the
rice. Lift the top end of the mat and keeping your fingers on the
ingredients, place it on the other end of the rice. Shape into a
compact, relatively tight cylinder. Finish the cylinder by rolling it
on the 4 cm gap of nori, which should be at the bottom. Cut into slices
about 2.5 cm thick.

Sushi Rolls in Different Sizes and Varieties The thicker rolls (known as futo-maki) can contain a blend of distinctive fillings, while more slender rolls (known as hoso-maki) are made with only one or two fixings. The thicker rolls are now and then wrapped in an egg omelet rather than nori, and the fillings are off and on again organized with the goal that they will look like a bloom when the roll is cut.

The more slender rolls contain a straightforward filling of fish, cucumber, natto(fermented soybeans), or ume-boshi(pickled plum), and so forth., and are frequently dipped and consumed with soy sauce.

Sushi restaurants outside of Japan have frequently thought of fascinating forms of the sushi roll, for example, a rendition containing crude fish, avocado, and mayonnaise, which have additionally ended up mainstream in Japan.